


Of Cakes and ZPMs

by respoftw



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Stargate, First Meeting, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-31
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-04-16 04:46:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,919
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14157072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/respoftw/pseuds/respoftw
Summary: An AU where Rodney is a scientist and John is a baker, featuring cakes, ZPMs and Miko in very spiky high heels.





	Of Cakes and ZPMs

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tarot_card](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarot_card/gifts).



> This is a birthday fic for dayzor. I hope you have a great birthday, bb.

Rodney fell in love and in lust on a Tuesday morning before his first cup of coffee had reached his bloodstream. He fell in love with the cream cheese frosted carrot cake cupcake (without citrus) that he’d picked out of the bakery window and he fell in lust with the tall, lean, spiky-haired baker who handed it to him.

“Did you make this?” 

In retrospect, Rodney should probably have finished his mouthful of the cupcake _before_ he asked that question but the hot baker seemed to find the spittle of crumbs that exploded from his mouth to lie like bomb debris on his shirt amusing.

“You like it?”  Tall, dark and incredibly-gifted-at-baking asked.  A smile that was more smirk than anything else played on his lips and Rodney swallowed the remains of his mouthful quickly before his dry mouth ruined the texture.  A smirk like that should be illegal, especially when combined with that sexy leaning thing that the man was doing. Rodney vaguely wondered if leaning on the counter where food would be served was hygienic but he really couldn’t bring himself to question it in case the leaning stopped.

“It’s acceptable,” Rodney said, downplaying his intense feelings of love for the cupcake.  From the way hot baker’s smirk grew wider, he guessed that he must have failed.

The obnoxious beeping of his mobile phone interrupted whatever hot baker was about to retort with and Rodney ducked to the side of the small shop, laying his travel mug of Kona coffee on the thin counter that lined the far wall.  Pulling his phone out of his pocket, he groaned at the all caps message from Radek, half of the words in Czech or maybe just really badly misspelt. Either way, he needed to get to the labs now.

Turning back to the counter, he saw hot baker busy serving a suburban soccer Mom who was leaning over the counter and flashing her cleavage in a very definitely unhygienic way, something that Rodney wasted no time in berating her for on his way out the door.

She turned a very unattractive shade of purple and stormed out without her pastries when hot baker let out a bitten off bray of a laugh at Rodney’s words.

“You want her pastries?” hot baker asked.  “I’m really not supposed to put them back when they’ve been bagged.”  He shook the bag a little.  "No citrus."

If the pastries tasted anything close to as good as the cupcake had, that was an offer that Rodney couldn’t refuse, no matter how desperately he needed to get to the labs.  He reached out to grab the bag and felt a shiver dance its way up his spine as their fingers brushed. It was almost like time stopped for a second and he had been spending way too much time listening to Miko talk about Hallmark channel movies for thinking that but it was weirdly true.

The bell over the door rang again, signalling more customers and the moment was broken.  Rodney had somewhere to be and hot baker had people to serve so with little more than a surprisingly husky “Come again” from the baker, Rodney left the store and found himself on the sidewalk a block from his subway station.  

His phone beeped again, more all caps Czech from Radek and Rodney let the busy sidewalk traffic sweep him in the direction of the station.

* * *

Rodney spent the next three days in the labs dealing with the ineptitude of Kavanagh and finding a way to fix everything the now very fired scientist had screwed up and finally emerged outside again at 10.45am on Friday morning.

He had no intentions of stepping foot back in the labs until Monday and had told his staff - the ones who had stayed with him to fix things anyway - the same.  Of course, they’d all probably be in there tomorrow anyway but the intention was there all the same.

Rodney marched himself home, almost falling asleep on the subway train and missing his stop.  By the time he climbed the stairs back onto the sidewalk, his feet felt like they were encased in lead, each step harder and heavier than the last.  His feet faltered outside the bakery from three days ago. His apartment was only half a block further up but he was suddenly struck by the idea that the distance would be made infinitely more bearable with some sugary treats to see him through.  

The pastries, which he had been forced to share with Miko and Radek, were every bit as delicious as the cupcake.  Rodney’s mouth had started watering at just the thought of them so he pushed his way through the door of the bakery, the little bell tinkling gently to announce his entry, and stopped short as someone who was decidedly _not_ a tall, spiky-haired hot baker stood behind the counter.

In his defence, he’d been awake for the better part of three days, surviving on stale coffee and power naps, so when he accused the server of exactly that - of not being the tall, spiky-haired hot baker from Tuesday - he wasn’t entirely aware of what he was saying.

“No,” the short, auburn-haired but very beautiful baker said, “I am not.  I am Teyla Emmagan, this is my bakery. I believe you are looking for John Sheppard.  Are you looking to order a cake?”

“Huh?”

Again, Rodney hadn’t slept properly in three days.  He wasn’t at his best.

“John makes special order cakes for us,” Teyla explained kindly, her tone suggesting that she thought she was dealing with someone very slow in the head.  “He very rarely works the counters, only when I am unable to cover a shift. Did you want to order a cake?”

“Yes,” Rodney said immediately.  “Yes, I did. And I, ah, I have a very specific design in mind.  I may need to sit down with John and discuss it.”

Teyla was far too polite to outright smirk at him but Rodney could tell she wanted to.

“Of course,” she said.  “If you wish to sit down I can call him from the back.”

“What, right now?!”  Rodney did not squeak exactly but it was a very close thing.  He’d expected to get an appointment or an email address, not have to come up with a cake idea right here and now.

“Well, if the design is as important as you suggested…”

Why had Rodney thought this woman was polite again?  She was obviously evil incarnate. Still, Rodney couldn’t see a way out of it so he sat in the small seating area tucked away in a corner and waited.  Once Teyla left the front of the store, he curled his palm around his mouth and breathed into it, wincing at the smell of his breath.

Before he could do anything about it, Teyla re-appeared with John in tow and Rodney hastily stuffed his hands under the table and tried very hard to pretend that he had been sitting there quietly.

He felt hot baker’s - John’s - eyes rake up and down the length of him and was painfully aware that he was still wearing the same clothes from three days ago and hadn’t shaved in all that time.  He probably looked like a hobo.

John exchanged a few quiet words with Teyla and then walked towards Rodney and pulled out the chair opposite him.

“Rough three days?” he drawled as he leant back in his chair.  Again with the leaning. Rodney had to pinch his upper thigh to will down his erection.  Three days had left him defenceless against his baser urges.

“Very rough,” Rodney said, clearing his throat.  An idea started to form in his mind and he began to hope that he could get through this whole encounter with his dignity intact.  “In fact, I want to order a cake for my colleagues at the lab who helped me divert disaster,” he said. 

John raised his eyebrows.  “We talking end of the world disaster?”

“Well, no, but 'end of the block' disaster certainly.”  Rodney mimicked a large explosion with his hands and John looked suitably impressed.  “We’re working on a way to pull energy from subspace and harness it safely. It’s called - - “

“ZPM technology,” John finished.

He had mispronounced the ‘Z’ but Rodney was used to Americans doing that.  He wasn’t used to random bakers knowing about the concept though. 

“I read a couple of papers on that,” John continued.  “It’s fascinating. I mean, there was this one paper by a C. Kavanagh that was terrible but this M.R McKay guy, he seemed to really be on to something.  Do you work with him?”

Rodney was dumbstruck, another thing he blamed on the past three days.  “I, well, I am him. M.R McKay, I mean.”

John grinned, his eyes lighting up and making him suddenly seventeen point six times more attractive.   “Well, Dr. McKay, what can I do for you?”

Rodney swallowed the words that he really wanted to reply with and started talking about cake design instead.  John must have paid really close attention to his paper because as soon as Rodney started talking about designing a cake in the shape of the crystalline structure that housed the zero point energy he was already sketching out the correct design.

After a half hour spent discussing everything from the filling to the sponge to the idea of trying to extract energy from an alternate reality instead of their own in order to eliminate the problems of creating dangerous exotic particles, Rodney left with the promise of a ZPM shaped cake - with absolutely no citrus - to be delivered to his office on Monday morning and a carrot cake cupcake to take home.

The cake, when it was delivered, was almost too pretty to eat.  They ate it anyway and it was the best thing Rodney had ever tasted in his life.

* * *

Over the next month, Rodney ordered five more cakes from Pegasus Bakery.  One for Kavanagh - John had gotten a kick at designing a cake in the shape of an asshole; one for Madison, never mind that her birthday was two months away.  He had made very sure to stress to John that Madison was his niece and not some - - well, maybe it was his imagination but John had seemed happier after Rodney had made that clear.  The fourth, fifth and sixth cakes he ordered were ostensibly for a birthday, a bon voyage and a corporate event but really they ended up being eaten by Rodney, Radek and Miko.

Rodney had put on at least five pounds since he started ordering the cakes but he couldn’t bring himself to care.  It was worth it. Even if Miko disagreed and started threatening to replace all of their chairs at work with those big bouncy exercise balls that looked more like instruments of torture than furniture.  

It was worth it because every time Rodney saw John he...well, he wasn’t sure if he would call it love but he definitely wanted to lick frosting off of every inch of John’s body and come home to him every day and talk about his work and bounce ideas off him and fall asleep beside him every night and - - who was he kidding, he was in love.

Who was he kidding, he was pathetic.

* * *

“If you will wait just a moment, Rodney, I’ll get John for you,” Teyla called over the heads of the waiting customers in line.    

It was at that moment; when Teyla smiled knowingly at him and just automatically assumed (correctly of course) that he was there to see John that Rodney realised how truly pathetic he was.  He had spent close to four hundred dollars on cakes this past month, all for the chance to spend some time with someone who was so out of his league that they probably shouldn’t even exist in the same galaxy.

He heard Teyla call out for John, heard the tell-tale sounds of John washing his hands in the back before stepping out and - - Rodney fled.  He almost knocked over two teenagers holding hands in his rush to escape and over the hurried apologies, he swore he could hear John calling his name but Rodney didn’t stop, just pushed through and disappeared down the street until he found refuge in his apartment.

It needed to stop.  He needed to stop.

No more bakery.  No more John.

* * *

For all their whining about the communal weight gain, Miko and Radek weren’t happy to hear that there would be no more cakes.  To appease them, Rodney started bringing in pastries from a different bakery, one on the office side of his subway ride but they weren’t anywhere near as good and after a few days of throwing most of them out in the trash, Rodney stopped altogether.

Between that and the extra two blocks he walked each morning to avoid going past the bakery, Rodney was in better shape than he’d been in for months.  None of that stopped him from being miserable.

* * *

Rodney was running late, his bag flapping against his hip as he ran up the stairs from the subway station.  As soon as he was on street level and getting service again, his phone started to beep incessantly, sounding as harried as he felt.

He didn’t even read the texts, just noticed that they were from Radek and all in caps.  Situation normal, all fucked up then. He was starting to think that they would never get their zero point theory to work, every attempt resulting in yet another failed simulation.  Hitching the strap of his bag more solidly on his shoulder, Rodney half ran, half walked to the labs, swiping his ID badge over the secure entry system and ignoring the way Chuck from reception was trying to get his attention.

Pushing his way into the labs, the last person he expected to be there was John.

“Rodney!” Radek grabbed him by the shoulders and squeezed, his always messy hair seeming even more crazy than usual.  “You will never believe what John has brought us. It is amazing, it is incredible. It is - - “

“It’s a cake,” Miko interrupted, standing on Radek’s foot with the spiky heel of her shoe. 

Radek’s mouth opened and shut in quick succession but after a look from Miko, he sighed.  “Fine, yes, it is cake. Look.”

Radek waved at the Pegasus bakery cake box that sat unopened on the square table that held their coffee machine and microwave.  

“I didn’t order a cake,” Rodney said dumbly.

“I made you one,” John said, speaking for the first time since Rodney arrived.  He looked uncomfortable, the tips of his too pointy ears red with embarrassment.  “I was going to leave it here,” Radek actually whimpered at that, causing Rodney to frown at him and Miko to stand on his foot again, “but your friends persuaded me to stay.  I, ah, well, you haven’t been by the bakery lately.” John wasn’t leaning at all. He was standing poker straight, the first time Rodney had ever seen him so formal. He didn’t like it.

“And maybe I was wrong to keep making you come back for more cakes but, well,” John shrugged, the corners of his mouth lifting into a half smile, “I liked talking to you and I looked forward to your visits and I, well…”  John opened the cake box and stood back, letting Rodney get a closer look.

It was a giant cupcake, a carrot cake cupcake, frosted with cream cheese icing and decorated with the beginnings of an equation.  Rodney moved closer, his eyes reading the familiar symbols which had been parsed together in a wholly unfamiliar way.

“John?  What is this?”

John's posture relaxed slightly.  His lips twitched in a smirk. “Well, I figured if I wanted to ask out the great Dr M.R. McKay, the usual ‘be mine’ wouldn’t do it.”

“Be mine?” Rodney repeated, needing to be sure he’d heard correctly.

“I’d love to,” John replied.  “If you’ll have me that is?”

“If I’ll - - oh my god, c’mere.” He grabbed for John’s waist and slotted himself flush against the lean lines of John’s body.  How a baker could stay so lean, Rodney had never been able to figure out but he’d like to spend the rest of his life plotting the theory out.  

Rodney’s face was inches away from John’s, their lips about to touch when Radek’s frustrated shout interrupted them.

“The equation, McKay, ask him about the equation.”  

From the strangled yelp that sounded right afterwards, Rodney figured that Miko had struck again but the moment was gone.  Rodney looked at the cake again and turned back to look at John who was still smiling softly.

“What is it?” he asked.

“Just something I’ve been working on,” John shrugged.  “I don’t know if it’s practical. I mean it might be nothing but it could be - - “

“This theory could bridge two realities together,” Radek broke in, waving a booklet in front of Rodney’s face.  “This could be what we’re missing. This could be it, Rodney. Zero point energy. Safely harnessed from another reality.”

Rodney grabbed the booklet from Radek’s hand and started flipping through it, his eyes growing wider with each page.

“Best cake ever?” John asked, his body relaxed and leaning against the wall.  

Rodney spun around and grabbed John’s shoulders, pulled him in for a kiss that had Radek groaning and Miko squealing with delight.

“Best. Cake. Ever.”


End file.
